Nursing Students’ Subjective Happiness: A Social Network Analysis

Abstract

Improving nursing students’ subjective happiness is germane for efficiency in the nursing profession. This study examined the subjective happiness of nursing students by applying social network analysis (SNA) and developing a strategy to improve the subjective happiness of nursing. The study adopted a cross sectional survey to measure subjective happiness and social network of 222 nursing students. The results revealed that the centralization index, which is a measure of intragroup interactions from the perspective of an entire network, was higher in the senior year compared with the junior year. Additionally, the indegree, outdegree, and centrality of the social network of students with a high level of subjective happiness were all found to be high. This result suggests that subjective happiness is not just an individual’s psychological perception, but can also be expressed more deeply depending on the subject’s social relationships. Based on the study’s results, to strengthen self-efficacy and resilience, it is necessary to utilize strategies that activate group dynamics, such as team activities, to improve subjective happiness. The findings can serve as basic data for future research focused on improving nursing students’ subjective happiness by consolidating team-learning social networks through a standardized program approach within a curriculum or extracurricular programs.

Research on the Impact of Peer Social Networks on Students Physical and Mental Development and Campus Happiness

“…Further substantiating the pivotal role of social network analysis, an examination of collaborative study groups within a university student cohort revealed that those possessing higher centrality and greater reciprocated ties demonstrated superior academic performance, subsequently reflecting more favorable academic aptitude assessments [4]. Likewise, akin profiles of students in another study exhibited elevated indices of happiness and improved mental health states [5], thereby furnishing foundational postulates for this study.…”

“…Through this network data, researchers can also comprehend the overall scale and organizational structure of the entire social network, along with various nodes representing students' positions within these networks. Through further computations, various network-related metrics of the entire network and individual nodes can be derived, including measures such as network density, connectivity, average distance, centrality, reciprocity, and more, as referred to in the context of nursing student well-being [5].…”

“…According to the discussions by the researchers, heightened centrality often enables these students to receive learning information and resources from other members, and their positive emotions are triggered when aiding others, ultimately contributing to their heightened sense of well-being. This process is bidirectional; those students with higher centrality or greater out-degree and in-degree intersections in the social network tend to possess stronger communication and interpersonal skills, factors which frequently correlate with improved mental well-being [5].…”

Resilience Improves the Quality of Life and Subjective Happiness of Physiotherapists during the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…The cognitive evaluation of happiness depends on individual experiences. High SH is a protective factor against the harmful effects of negative emotions [ 89 ]. In our study, physiotherapists who showed lower scores in the evaluation of SH were those with low resilience who were working directly with COVID-19 patients.…”

“…The low-resilience group presented lower scores for SH, compared with the high-resilience group (4.25 [3.62-5.00] vs. 5.50 [5.00-6.25]), p < 0.001 (Table 4). Table 5 shows that participants working with COVID-19 patients had lower scores (median (IQR)) on the SF-36, compared with those who do not work with COVID-19 patients (p < 0.001): physical functioning (85 vs. 95 [85][86][87][88][89][90][91][92][93][94][95][96][97][98][99][100]), role-physical (50 vs. 100 ), bodily pain (51 vs. 84 ), general health (67 vs. 80 , vitality (40 vs. 65 ), role-emotional (33 [0-100] vs. 100 [91][92][93][94][95][96][97][98][99][100]), and mental health (52 vs. 82 ). There was no difference in social functioning between the COVID and NO COVID groups (50 [37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50] vs. 50 [37]…”